Setting Up a Paint Spray Gun - There’s A Pattern Developing Here

Paint is likely one of the most intimidating things consistent among all corners of the automotive world. It requires heaps of laborious preparation and the materials cost a ton, and that’s nothing to say of the mysterious device required to apply the stuff. I’ve yet to see a paint gun that so much as indicates the functions of its various knobs. There’s a sort of medieval appeal to the whole process; just as the ability to draw the sword from the stone confirmed the true king of England, somehow the ability to make sense of a gun’s knobs is innate to only those ordained to be painters.

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Fortunately that’s just plain bull. Paint gun setup is not just within anyone’s abilities, it’s easy. What follows is one person’s setup technique.

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We say one person’s because no two painters will exactly agree how to set up a gun. In fact, the method our pal Sam Ferguson presented is likely to infuriate other painters. Some painters are that way, you know.

But according to Ferguson this technique is a pretty foolproof method to set up nearly any gun for nearly any application. More than endorse it, he lives by it; Ferguson paints professionally.

First, a few things. He’s an Iwata man but most of us laypeople can’t justify the expensive equipment he uses. So we had him show us his technique on the Eastwood gun we reviewed in the Aug. ’11 “Workshop.” Not that it matters, really; he maintains that every gun he’s used responds to this technique. In fact he said that he learned this technique when he began painting. And that was with older, high-pressure guns.

4/15Sam Ferguson starts by opening the pattern-control knob (upper) and fluid-control knob (lower) all the way.

And we don’t want to hear about him not using a respirator. It’s because he didn’t need to this time; we conducted this exercise with Auto Air Color’s non-toxic water-based paint. Were he to shoot conventional paint he’d don a paint suit, respirator, gloves, and so forth. And so should you; isocyanate in modern paint won’t just get you high; it’ll make you nearer your god to thou, so to speak.

What follows isn’t enough to make one a good painter; however, it’s a good first step. And while it won’t match every other method out there, it does in fact work as I witnessed. Follow it, and there’s no reason it won’t work for you too.